What exactly happened in Aleppo

Since Turkish press show “the wonders of political correctness”, and Russia keeps dead silence, we had to compile reports from a variety of sources in order to understandwhat happened in the Aleppo area. Here is an approximate picture.

Putin’s advisers are clearly not very knowledgeable about the details of the Syrian conflict, because if they had sufficient knowledge and common sense, they would’ve never got into it, but it is as it is.The reason for the sharp aggravation of the situation around Aleppo is another Kremlin’s miscalculation.The thing is that the following forces fight for Assad: Russian Federation, “vacationers” from Iran, and Hezbollah.The nominal opponent is ISIS, but in fact – Free Syrian Army (FSA).Roughly speaking, the regular Russian army, supported by air force, fleet, and armored vehicles, with the participation of ground troops of allies, fight the Syrian opposition, who have no regular army, no air force, no navy.Nevertheless, the success in 6 months was quite modest.That all changed at the moment when Moscow bought the Kurds.

Previously, the Kurds did not play an active role in this scenario.Sometimes they were oppressing ISIS, but most of the times they were busy with their own affairs, and did not touch FSA.However, it all changed a couple weeks ago.The Kurds did not just hit the FSA from behind, but started coordinating their actions with the Russians.This made it possible to cut the supply lines of the FSA from Turkey, which meant a “pocket“.All massive airstrikes of the Russian Air Force were intended to destroy the surrounded opposition.But two things happened that Moscow did not expect.

The first tragedy was that Turkey decided not to wait for Washington’s approval, and began to sweep the Kurds to the north from Aleppo, and along the border in general.Kurds, who were striking FSA from behind, got a similar and sudden, but more powerful hit from Turkish troops.Moreover, “vacationers” from Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia went into Syria.Small and mobile, very motivated and professional groups turned the north of Syria into hell for the Kurds.It was clear that the northern “claw” of Aleppo’s “pocket” has hung at once, so the Russians threw their armored vehicles and infantry (with air support) into the battle.

But the East, as it is known, is a delicate matter. Not everyone in ISIS understood the Russian maneuver correctly, and took it as support to the enemy, that is – treason.The Russians (entirely confident in the security of their logistics and communications) jumped into Aleppo, and ISIS closed the window behind them, and began to hammer the surrounded. The principle “do not dig a pit to others” worked.According to reports from social networks, the surrounded were so shocked that they could not make a defensive perimeter, and were defeated.We are talking about hundreds of deaths, and tens of captives, including Russians. The fact how hard the Russians tried to break through the pocket only confirms this.But the most interesting thing was that after the ISIS have dealt with the group, captured prisoners and booty, they stepped back to their original positions. Thus, the purpose of the operation was not a seizure of the territory, but rather destroying Russians.To leave no one in doubt, the ISIS made an “etalon” terrorist attack on the Russian military base near Latakia, blowing up a car loaded with explosives, and sending the whole meeting of senior officers of the Russian Armed Forces to heaven.Who exactly – we are closely watching the obituaries.

Incompetent “multi-steppers” in Syria left Putin no room for manoeuvre, only demoralizing losses. By all means, now Putin has to show an example of bloody revenge, but the other side has clearly hinted that they can revenge too, and even harder. Meanwhile, the Turks and the Saudis said that they did not declare ceasefire, so they do not intend to obey it.There is an assumption that the profession of “undertaker” in Russia becomes the most prestigious.